Day 36: Technology is a crutch

Most of us sit behind a desk or rather at a computer for much of our day. Even here in Iraq, leaders can be in the most austere combat outposts, but still use a connection to get intelligence, send and receive reports, and basically understand what is going on around them and outside of their area of influence.

I've gained a new appreciation for just how dependent we are on electronic communications over the past 2 days as the non-secure network has gone down.

The internet still works sporadically, but no access to common shared portals and no email. It has made life considerably more of a pain in the ass. For instance, I interviewed the outgoing deputy division commander the day before yesterday. It was a 90 minute interview and he was a talker. It took me a little bit of time to convert 20 pages of notes into an 11 page interview draft. This was a rush because I wanted to get it to him before he left. Once I completed it, I realized that not only could I not send it to him over email, I couldn't even print it out and give him a hardcopy to mark up because the print server is hooked up to the network and also down. And I cannot put the document on a USB stick and give it to him because information security here has disabled all of the USB ports. Next thing you know, Skynet will become self-aware and wipe us off the face of the planet. (Ant, where are my Sarah Connors Chronicles??)

When the network does come up again, there will be 2 days of email ready to go and arrive x however many people on the network and it wouldn't surprise me if the system went into overload again...

On the same theme, the Army signal powers-that-be have blocked hotmail access, which is my primary source of email. I don't know why they'd block it and not yahoo, but now I have to go through this emulator called flurrymail that generically takes any account and pwd and pulls in the emails. Only problem is that it's a horrific interface and displays emails literally on a makeshift cellphone screen that shows 25 characters per line and can't display photos, attachments, or weblinks. Just like checking email on a regular cellphone (not a PDA).

Does anyone know of a different way to access Hotmail or forward it to Outlook?

On the bright side, I finally got access to a little gym that belongs to one of the tenant units! There are cardio machines inside, some weight machines, free weights, and a 2 stretching mats of about 5'x10' each. Not bad for something the size of a classroom.

On the days I work out, I generally will run a few miles (in addition to the 4 miles I walk to work/chow hall/gym) and then do some weights and stretching. I'm trying to get the Brazilian Jiujitsu guys I trained with in Shanghai to suggest some sport-specific exercises to stay in shape.

I also sat down and talked with the coordinator of all the different lethal and non-lethal engagement capabilities (these are things like field artillery, mortars, targeting, psychological operations, government reconstruction teams, civil affairs, local human intelligence, etc). He explained what he was interested in getting some eyes on and I shared with him what I thought I'd like to cover.

That opens the door for me to circulate amongst his teams, get information, and then tag on for some direct observations out in the field.

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